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Principal Investigator: Farhang Alem
Organization: GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY
Fiscal Year: 2022
Award: $4,039,853
Funding agency: National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
Project Summary/Abstract:
The ongoing COVID pandemic has demonstrated the need for state-of-the-art facilities and infrastructure to
improve our preparedness for subsequent epidemics and/or pandemics. George Mason University (GMU),
leveraging the Regional Biocontainment Laboratory, designated as the Biomedical Research Laboratory
(BRL), has established a biomedical research program with a strong emphasis on newly emerging and re-
emerging viral and bacterial pathogens with the potential to cause severe human and animal diseases. The
specific viral pathogen families of greatest pandemic concern currently investigated in the BRL are:
Togaviridae, Bunyaviridae, Coronaviridae, and Flaviviridae. Several faculty members in five departments at
GMU (Systems Biology, Biology, Bioengineering, Biochemistry, and Global and Community Health) as well as
external collaborators conduct research on basic and applied research to include pathogenicity, infection
mechanisms, and development of diagnostics, vaccines and therapeutics.
The infectious disease portfolio at GMU was $8.8 million in FY21 and is expected to grow by at least 3X in the
next five years. To realize this goal, GMU leadership is making aggressive, strategic investments in new faculty
hires and seed funding, as well as creating broader access to the BRL. More than 244 peer-reviewed articles
on infectious diseases research have been published by GMU investigators since 2010.
The BRL staff is dedicated to supporting GMU faculty, students, and their collaborators to develop new
translational solutions for pandemic preparedness. Research with translational promise includes 1)
development of additional vaccine candidates that confer broad-spectrum protection against multiple strains of
alphaviruses or coronaviruses, 2) evaluation of host-based therapeutics that have demonstrated in vitro broad-
spectrum efficacy against alphaviruses (VEEV, EEEV, WEEV, CHIKV), bunyaviruses (RVFV) and
coronaviruses (SARS-CoV-2) in rodent and nonrodent animal models including ferrets, and 3) development of
new platform technologies including extracellular vesicle (EV)-based immunomodulators and reporter viruses
that can facilitate rapid screening of clinical and nonclinical samples for neutralizing antibodies.
Our high containment facility supported by a team of operations and technical staff, creates opportunities for a
broad base of internal and external investigators to conduct in vitro and in vivo research and development on
newly emerging and re-emerging viral and bacterial pathogens. GMU is requesting funds to supplement the
funded G20 parent award, “Facility and Building System Upgrades Support for the Mason Biomedical
Research Laboratory” to resolve additional specific instrumentation and facility gaps that will support the
creation of a modern, comprehensive, agile and resilient preclinical biomedical research pipeline to address
national and global pandemic preparedness.
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